


The Last Blind Date

by Brumeier



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe, Anniversary, Community: mcsheplets, First Dates, First Kiss, First Meetings, M/M, Prompt Fill, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-08
Updated: 2017-02-08
Packaged: 2018-09-23 00:14:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9631034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brumeier/pseuds/Brumeier
Summary: Rodney didn't have high expectations for a blind date on Valentine's Day, but for once he doesn't mind being proved wrong.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [squidgie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/squidgie/gifts).



> Fills McSheplets prompt #247: Hot.

Rodney was absolutely not desperate.

Sure, his dating track record was fairly abysmal, but he wasn’t going to apologize for having high standards. Rodney was a genius, bettering the world through brilliance and innovation, and he didn’t have the patience to deal with someone who could only talk about the latest season of _The Bachelor_ , or insisted on showing him a hundred pictures of their dog.

There was no good reason he’d let Laura set him up on a blind date, on Valentine’s Day no less, except that she’d worn him down with her endless descriptions of how perfect this guy John was, and how Rodney needed to take a chance so he didn’t die alone. It was a stupid argument – he was only thirty-six, it wasn’t like he was a middle-aged shut-in or something.

Wong’s Royal Noodle, which Rodney considered the best Chinese place in town, was doing a brisk business, couples looking at each other with goo-goo eyes. The only concession that had been made to the holiday was to stick plastic hearts on stakes in with the fake flower arrangements. There was a very strong possibility that at some point before the night was over there’d be a man on his knees, proposing. It was sickening.

“This is a terrible idea,” Rodney muttered to himself. He fiddled with the table setting.

Blind dates were for romantic comedies, not real life. It would end up being an awkward evening with a total stranger, with whom he had nothing in common, compounded by certain holiday-related expectations, and he didn’t –

“You must be Rodney.”

Rodney looked up, and hoped the dismay didn’t show on his face. It was worse than he thought. The guy was hot. Too hot! What was Laura thinking?

“John?”

“That’s me.” He held out his hand, and looked amused when Rodney nearly knocked over his chair in his haste to get to his feet. He had a very firm handshake.

John sat down across from Rodney at the table and shook out his napkin. “Nice place.”

“If you like Chinese food. Uh…you do like Chinese food. Don’t you?” Had he asked Laura that? Rodney couldn’t remember. He’d chosen Wong’s because they knew him there and he trusted that the food they prepared him wouldn’t result in a hospital stay.

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“No. They don’t.”

John looked amused. “Well, I do.”

“They really do have the best noodles here,” Rodney said, feeling an irrational need to justify his choice of restaurant.

“Great.”

There was an awkward pause – Rodney mentally sighed, because he could see the whole date playing out that way – and then John tried a new conversational gambit.

“Laura tells me you’re some kind of brainiac.”

Well, that was disappointing even though Rodney had been expecting it. Pretty face, empty head. Just like everyone else Laura set him up with.

“Something like that,” he replied. “I wouldn’t want to bore you with the details.”

“No. Please. Bore me.”

So Rodney did, in great detail, until Walter Wong himself came to take their order. If he’d expected John to be glassy eyed, he was mistaken. His blind date seemed focused and interested, almost as if he’d understood everything Rodney had been telling him.

“You are ready to order, Dr. McKay?” Walter bowed deferentially, his hands clasped behind his back. He was short, easily a foot below Rodney, and whip thin.

“I’ll have my usual,” Rodney said. “And make sure the pans –”

“Yes, of course. Only sterilized ones.” Walter waved him off. “And your companion?”

John placed his order after a quick study of the menu, and Rodney noticed he didn’t order anything with citrus in it. Had Laura already briefed him on Rodney’s allergy?

“So,” John said once Walter left. “What you’re saying is that you’re working on a way to use zero-point energy to create a battery. Long life, no by-products. Cool.”

Rodney was aware that his mouth was hanging open and he probably looked like an idiot, but he didn’t care. He might be forced to revise his opinion of John’s intelligence.

“I thought Laura picked you up in the park.”

John raised one eyebrow. “We go running together. Do you have to make me sound like a rent boy?”

“How do I know you’re not one?” Rodney countered. Maybe it was all a setup. Maybe Laura was trying to teach him some kind of lesson, or had just gotten tired of trying to save his love life.

“I guess you don’t,” John replied, and he gave Rodney such a heated look that Rodney blushed.

“Uh…”

“Relax, Rodney. I teach AP math classes at Hopgood High.”

“Oh. Well, that doesn’t explain how you know about zero-point energy.” Rodney knew he was doing that thing where he couldn’t just go with the flow, which Laura had repeatedly told him to stop because it was off-putting. John would probably leave any second.

But John didn’t leave. Instead, he ducked his head and rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. “Well…Laura coached me. A little. I wanted to make a good first impression. She said you can be tough.”

Rodney wasn’t sure how to respond to that. He was flattered that John was trying so hard, of course. What the hell had Laura told him? And he seemed pretty sincere, though admittedly Rodney wasn’t the best at reading social cues or body language.

“So tell me about teaching,” Rodney said when he couldn’t think of anything else.

John looked up and grinned at him, and proceeded to make him laugh with stories of his students and their math shenanigans. 

They talked all through dinner. Rodney learned that John had a Masters, and was smart enough that he could be applying his mathematical skills to some really high-level, high-profile projects. But he honestly loved teaching high school kids, and getting them fired up about math, which Rodney supposed was admirable in its own way.

Like Rodney, John was estranged from his family. He liked football (American, of course), country music, and Ferris wheels. And he peppered Rodney with questions about himself, his interests, his work, his citrus allergy.

Rodney got the sense John actually liked _him_ , which wasn’t unheard of but unusual all the same. Especially on a first date. It was with no small amount of reluctance that he paid his half of the bill, because he wasn’t ready to leave.

“I had a really nice time,” John said as they lingered out front of the restaurant. Walter didn’t have valet parking, so Rodney was waiting for an Uber and John had parked down the street. “I have to work tomorrow, or I’d suggest maybe going out for drinks.”

Rodney took a deep breath. “Well, I’m free this weekend. You know. If you wanted to go out again. With me.”

“How about Saturday?”

Rodney had to fight to keep the big grin off his face. He didn’t want to seem too eager and scare John off. “Sure. Yeah.”

They exchanged numbers, and John promised to text him with details in the next day or two. Rodney’s driver pulled up, idling at the curb.

“So,” John said. He leaned in and kissed Rodney, a quick peck of the lips that caught Rodney by surprise. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

He walked away, whistling under his breath. Rodney got into the car, his heart pounding in his chest.

“First date?” the driver asked.

“No,” Rodney said, turning to look out the rear window. “I think that was my last blind date.”

**25 Years Later**

Rodney noisily slurped a mouthful of noodles off the chopsticks in his hand.

“This was a great idea. I’m glad we didn’t dine in.”

There were takeout containers from Wong’s Royal Noodle scattered around on the bed, but for once he didn’t care about grease stains on the sheets. An athletic round of sex followed by lukewarm Chinese food turned out to be the most perfect thing in the world.

“Yeah, they really frown on the patrons having sex in the dining room,” John said around a mouthful of eggroll.

Rodney could picture that all too well, bending John over one of the white-clothed tables while everyone else in the room watched in envy.

“Do I even want to know what you’re thinking about?” John asked, eyebrow raised.

“Hmm. Maybe later.” After all, he wasn’t as young as he used to be. Thankfully he wasn’t at the point yet where he needed chemical help. Just a longer bit of recovery time.

John shrugged and turned his attention back to his eggroll. Rodney looked at him, _really_ looked at him. John had put on a little weight, which he was trying to work off at the gym, his hair was really starting to go grey, and he needed reading glasses now, but he was still the hot guy that had charmed Rodney all those years ago. 

Who else could look so good sitting cross-legged and naked, hair sticking up like he’d stuck his finger in a light socket, eating Chinese food?

And though he professed to not have a romantic bone in his body, it was John who suggested recreating – sort of – their first date as a way to celebrate their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. Rodney would never admit how moved he was by that.

He leaned forward and kissed John, heedless of their greasy lips or his own garlic breath. John kissed him back with fervor.

“Happy anniversary, Rodney.”

“Happy anniversary, John.”

**Author's Note:**

>  **AN:** This is an anniversary present for squidgiepdx, who had his own very successful blind date at a Chinese restaurant on Valentine’s Day. ::grins:: Thanks for the inspiration! And Happy Anniversary to you and your Boo, Squidgie! ::hugs::

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [BEGIN|NING](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9645227) by [writerdragonfly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/writerdragonfly/pseuds/writerdragonfly)




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